A heated debate has emerged in parenting circles: Should kids be allowed to walk to school? In 1969, nearly 50% of kids walked. Today, that number has dropped to 13%, with many parents arguing that it’s just too dangerous nowadays to let kids walk. Are they right? The Takeaway's correspondent, Andrea Bernstein, was at the Walk21 NYC conference yesterday in New York to talk with people about urban planning strategies for city walking. We also talk to Gina Lovasi, from Columbia University's Mailman School of Public Health, about the health implications. Jeremiah Weintraub, a fifth-grader from West Virginia who's been riding his bike to school for over two years, joins us with his thoughts on the matter.

Call it Driving While Distracted, or DWD. It may not sound as serious as DWI, but driving and texting or twittering or "just" checking your email is a serious enough issue that dozens of elected officials, transit groups and law enforcement agencies are gathering in Washington today to look at what can be done about it. We hear from Kristin Backstrom of AAA Foundation for Traffic Safety, who will be at the conference, New Jersey State Trooper Sergeant Stephen Jones and his daughter Alicia Jones, who admits to texting while driving.

The Department of Transportation is offering a live webcast of the summit. Watch here.

A new study, whose findings will be released later today, says that driving while texting makes you 23 times more likely to get into an accident. This morning we're joined by Dr. Rich Hanowski, Director for the Center of Truck and Bus Safety at Virginia Tech Transportation Institute, which conducted the study. Also joining the discussion is Adam Bryant, Deputy Business Editor of The New York Times, who's been working on the “Driven to Distraction” series.

A study says that if you're using your cell phone while driving, you're just as likely to crash as someone who has been drinking. But most states don't ban texting while driving. And no state has banned driving while talking on the phone. The New York Times reports that federal agencies withheld studies showing how dangerous texting while driving actually is. Joining The Takeaway is Adam Bryant, New York Times Deputy Business Editor.

A fatal plane crash in Northwest Iran has left 168 people dead. The Caspian Air flight was headed from Tehran to the Armenian capital of Yerevan; it crashed 16 minutes after departure. Caspian, a 16-year-old commercial airline, operates within Iran and to Syria, Turkey, Ukraine, the United Arab Emirates and Armenia, using Russian-made Tupolev jets. For more, The Takeaway turns to Borzou Daragahi, Beirut bureau chief for the LA Times. Also joining the conversation is Graham Warwick, senior technology editor of Aviation Week. There have been four major crashes in six weeks: are planes not as safe as we think?

Three popular trucks have received bad ratings in side crash tests from the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, a non-profit group backed by car insurance companies. Here's video via YouTube:
The IIHS test results don't all jibe with ratings from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, where the Silverado gets five stars for side-impact safety. You can look up all the safety ratings for your car or truck at the NHTSA's safercar.gov Web site.

Most of us have heard of the hygiene hypothesis. It's the theory that all of our antibacterial soaps and scrubs and sprays are actually weakening our immune systems. But here’s something new: Scientists say you may be able to treat certain diseases like autism and multiple sclerosis by ingesting the same worms we’ve spent all those years trying to kill. The Takeaway talks to Dr. Joel Weinstock, chief of the division of gastroenterology and hepatology at Tufts University Medical Center.

Salmonella-tainted peanut butter has sickened close to five hundred people in 43 states, and killed six. People started getting sick back in September, but the FDA has only recently pinpointed the source of the infection as King Nut brand peanut butter manufactured by Peanut Corporation of America in Blakely, Georgia. Bill Marler, a Seattle lawyer who represents victims of food poisoning and advises companies on food safety joins John and Adaora to explain why it takes so long to trace foodbourne illnesses and how the system could be improved.

FDA website list of recalled products: http://www.fda.gov

Dr. Ron Lobel is the medical director of a hospital about 17 kilometers from the Gaza border. His hospital treated both Israelis and Palestinians alike, until the borders closed. Now, he joins John and Adaora from Ashkelon, Israel where he puts a human face on the story of two embattled rivals and his patients who can't return home.